Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
COLSON
“Fucking two women in one night? That takes balls. Which I know you have since I’ve unfortunately seen them with my own eyes. But that’s low … even for you.”
So, she was accusing me of sleeping with Marci.
Or at least wanting to. But it wasn’t just the accusation that had stood out.
What had weighed equally was the anger that radiated from her and the sharpness in her tone.
Both could only be driven by jealousy. If Sophie didn’t give a fuck about me, she wouldn’t be bothered by Marci.
There were several ways I could tackle this. Silence wasn’t an option. The one route that would feel the most satisfying was to not go easy on her. The shark needed to know there were other predators in the water as lethal as her.
“Question for you.” Marci spoke from the other side of the table.
Her enthusiasm caused me to grin. As I did, I wondered if Sophie had caught a glance of it, making the storm within her body churn even faster. I wouldn’t look at her to know—with the stunt she had just pulled, she didn’t deserve my eyes.
“Is there any interest in building a Toro in Florida?”
Toro had one hell of a reputation. Our seafood and raw bar was in high demand. Rumors were buzzing on where we were going to open our next location.
“Sounds like you want some of everything in this state.”
“I do.” She smiled.
As I described our expansion plans, I simultaneously typed out a message to Sophie.
Me
A little bit of jealousy could look really fucking hot on you.
But not in this case and not with the shit you just stirred.
You know, for a top lawyer, I’d think you’d lay out all the facts before you came up with a bullshit assumption.
I would say a hate fuck would probably do us well, but you don’t even deserve that right now.
After I sent the message, I copied the link to Marci’s bio, taken from our company’s corporate website, and pasted it into the thread.
That bit of information would certainly drive home the point that this dinner was purely business-based.
But as I thought about it, I decided I didn’t owe her any proof.
I had said what I’d said in my first message, and that was enough.
I deleted the link and slipped my phone into my pocket. “You know what? How about we go check out a place down the street? The wait here has been too long.” A statement that wasn’t a lie. I just didn’t want to be under the observation of Sophie for a second longer.
“I’m game.” She climbed off her chair.
I paid our drink tab, and never once did I peer over my shoulder to look in Sophie’s direction, not even when I walked out of the restaurant with Marci at my side.
After another sleepless night, I could only think of one way to get my head straight, and that was hitting the pavement to get several miles under my feet, hoping to pound out the thoughts eating at me.
Since I wasn’t meeting Hayden for several hours, the timeline worked.
Besides, I couldn’t spend another moment in this suite.
My buddies, the Coles and Spades, had built and maintained a hell of a hotel here; I just didn’t want to be confined by its walls.
I needed out.
I needed air.
I exited through the lobby just as the sun started to rise.
I wasn’t more than a few feet past the expansive circular driveway when I smelled the ocean.
With the other side of the hotel facing it, the water wasn’t far.
Instead of running on the sand, I headed for the beachfront promenade that aligned the back side of the beach.
A long stretch of sidewalk that I shared with fellow runners and walkers and dogs, giving me plenty to look at besides the Atlantic.
I passed coffee shops opening for the early morning crowd.
Restaurants and bars that were still closed from the evening before.
And then there was Sophie.
At this point, I wasn’t even surprised that she was headed right for me, approximately a hundred yards away, dressed in spandex shorts that weren’t more than a few inches long and a sports bra, both in red.
Even if her face had been blocked by a hat and sunglasses, which it wasn’t, I would have recognized that body anywhere.
Her gorgeous, toned legs. Her perfect-sized tits, secured by an athletic bra that still allowed her to bounce with each stride.
Her blonde hair was tied high on her head, the curls from her ponytail hitting the sides of her face.
I didn’t know where she kept her gaze when she ran—shit, I hadn’t even known she was a runner—but I sensed the second she recognized me. Her lips pulled tight. Her legs lifted higher, her speed increasing.
I was positive she was going to go right past me, so when she came to a stop only a few paces from me, she caught me off guard. It was a good thing I had already slowed or we would have collided.
She held her hips, her chest heaving, her breath coming out in pants, reminding me of the evening at Lush when I had edged her for hours, similar sounds filling that room.
“Good morning, Sophie.” I crossed my arms over my bare chest. “What can I do for you?”
Now that I was even closer, I appreciated the thin, tight material that was wedged into her pussy, showing me in detail the spot where my tongue had spent many hours. The hardening of her nipples, poking right into the red. The beads of sweat that covered the top of her chest.
And her eyes, the set of sapphire that glared at me with such hardness.
“Do for me?” Her head leaned back, and as she stared at the sky, she laughed. “You can disappear. That’s what I’d love more than anything.” She finally looked at me. “I’m really tired of seeing you everywhere I go. It’s like I can’t breathe without you sharing the same air.”
“Hey, I came out for a run. How was I supposed to know you were doing the same?” I pointed toward the direction I had just come from. “You can keep going and pretend the last couple of seconds never existed. No one made you stop.”
She began to move, but not in the direction in which I’d pointed. She was pacing a small, circular area in front of me, going back and forth. “You’re making me lose it—you know that?” Her hands folded behind her neck. “I don’t know what the hell is happening to me, but …”
“I take it, that means you’re sorry?”
She stilled. “Excuse me?”
I was already smiling. Her expression, which told me she adamantly disagreed with what I’d just said, only added to my grin.
“You’re sorry for the way you acted at the restaurant last night. And you regret not reaching out when you got home because you know we would have had one hell of a night together.”
She blinked multiple times. “I’m not sorry.”
Now it was my turn to laugh. “Why’s that?”
“All I know is that you asked to come over. I didn’t give you an answer. And then the next thing I saw was you with another woman.”
“Why are you bothered by that?”
“You asked to come to my place, Colson.” Her hands were at her sides, clenching.
“So?”
“You’re saying it’s okay to sleep with her and then fuck me on the same night?”
I licked the outer edge of my lips. “Do I need to remind you that we’re not together? Most of our conversations revolve around you telling me how much you hate me. Therefore, who I spend time with and who I sleep with, that shouldn’t affect you at all. Just like I wasn’t affected by you and Jones.”
Which was a goddamn lie. The sight of them still nagged at my fucking nerves. That smile she had given him—I didn’t like it.
She wiped her forehead, keeping her fingers there after she was done. “What are you even talking about?”
“I think what I said was pretty clear.” I shifted my weight.
“Affected by Jones and me?” She continued to stare into my eyes. “You think I’m with Jones? Or that I have been?”
“You guys looked pretty cozy at dinner. But did you see me getting jealous and accusing you? Nah. I said nothing and kept those thoughts to myself.”
“No. You held those thoughts until you found a perfect opportunity to throw them at me. Don’t act like you’re innocent.”
“And all I’m saying is, don’t be a double standard, Sophie.”
Her hand moved over the top of her head, stretching her forehead so hard that her brows lifted.
“I can’t believe what I’m hearing right now.
You sat at a table with a woman, and the two of you couldn’t stop gazing at one another.
You ran your fingers through her hair. She touched your hand.
But me?” She pointed at her chest. “I simply have a conversation with a friend—a best friend actually—and you’re trying to tell me we’re the same?
” She huffed. “The situations aren’t even close to being alike. ”
I ran my hand through her hair? I began to rewind that evening in my head. What the fuck is she talking about? I groaned, “Jesus,” when it hit me. “What you saw, and the reality of the situation were two very different things.”
“It doesn’t matter.” She shook her head. “I don’t care.”
I chuckled. “If you’re angry, which I see you are, then it does matter.”
“I’m not angry.” She took a breath, lifting her shoulders high. “I’m just done.”
“You’re done because I was taking something out of her hair?
Sure, I could have left it in there, but if I had something stuck to my hair, I would hope someone would save me the embarrassment and remove it.
And the way my arm had been positioned when the sunroof was down on the yacht Hayden and I were touring yesterday gave me a funky tan line.
” I showed her what I was talking about.
“She commented on it and touched my hand. That’s what you saw.
And that’s what you made a big fucking deal of. ”
“Colson”—she rolled her eyes—“you were on a date.”